[Bonetools] A thing of beauty is a joy or fever

[François Poplin]

The play with the knight was to consider the series of ocelli : these on 
the flanks are deeply polished out, whereas the one behing is fresh. 
This shows that the piece was grasped between thumb and fingers 1 an 2 
(fr. 2 et 3), as a salt pinch/sprinkle. If it were possible to 
distinguish the touches of thumb and following digits, it could be 
possible to determine, owing to the reasonable view that the head was 
hold in front, that the players were often right handed, for example. 
The principal thing at the moment is that polishing by fingers/hand is 
readible thanks to the ocelli - as on the dice.

This is the same on fig. 4 of Idola Grau-Sologestoa, and more visible on 
the attached picture she provided me [can you open ?]. The series of 
interdental impacts of the chisel are obliterated by polishing : they 
are not fresh, not wound like, even not cicatrice remembering, but 
rather /vibices/. This polish has been brought by the second use, which 
ended with the rupture of the bone. The break cuts at least a series of 
impacts, showing that these has been done formerly. The sickel toothing 
could have been done intercurrently, occasionnaly, at once (*), not 
primarily, and has been chronogicaly overlapped by the second use.

Before going any further (there are lots to say), I would like to make 
clear that point, which is decisive : it seems that the little round 
boring went through the whole bone (look the break between the 
interrupted series of impacts ant the longitunal crack), and the same is 
suggested for the big elliptic one on fig. 4 - and by the fact that the 
series of impacts are interrupted at its level in/on the length of bone.

One must add the fact the distal end has been removed, etc. : that bone 
is definitely different of those to which I want to come since weeks and 
months.

(*) The way the series of impacts are not in regular rows supports this. 
Their total length on the fragment is about 20 cm ; it is dangerous to 
multiply by 2, because this fragment is less than a half (the big 
elliptic hole is not in the middle of the shaft, but a little big more 
proximal). Therefore, a reasonable estimate is about 30 cm, which points 
on a unique sickle.

--------------------------------------------

Preliminarily :

cord, rope, string ? I'll use /cord/ because of the vicinity with both 
french /corde/ and spanish /cordon/.

auger, bit, drill, trepan ? I'll use /bit/ because I need to 
point/specify the metallic rotating and active part/piece/axis/axle 
biting into the material (spanish /broca/).

And now :

suppose you are going to drill a hole, with the bit put on the material 
in left hand. The right hand coils up the cord clockwise, so as it is 
tangent/tangential at 3 h. You cover the bit with left hand and pull the 
cord. The drill turns clockwise. If you want to protect your left hand, 
you put a "bit-cap"/"bit-cover", and if you have to act in force, you 
call a second pair of man's hands grasping a cross-rung/cross-beam as 
bit-cap (1), giving a double handle as on a pneumatic tool/drill ; so as 
to "take the bull by the horns" (fr. tenir le taureau par les cornes, 
spanish : <I would like to know>).

The cord is pulled towards 6 h. If it were attached with a knot around 
the bit, it would pull the bit directly and entirely in that direction. 
As the action is tangential (which gives the rotating movement), this 
pulling towards 6 is only partial, and the turning action gives a 
certain pulling effect towards the left ; the resultant being a pulling 
towards "down left on the watch", let us say towards 7 h for example. 
That drifft/lee-way will ovalize in that way the bit housing - and now, 
you print and see trough from the back the page 89 of the paper send by 
Simon Davis, and you get it.

You have it elementarily with the distal hole fig. 36, and it goes on 
with the intermediate, where a symmetric effect brings the complement : 
that bone is technically reversible, both ends being roughly 
interchangeable in form. It was used equally with distal part or 
proximal part on the left, and when you turn the page upset down, the 
figure of holes does not change. (2)

When you have to cover the bit quickly (this work is long and time is 
money), it is useful to have not only a single hole/housing, but rather 
several, not to have to grope too much ; and to have not to choose 
"distal or proximal". With a certain acquaintance of the tool, you find 
your marks, and no matter the orientation of bone itself, the 
pertinent/relevan being to have it with a symmetric/reversible 
arrangement/adjustment. And the most visited and ovalized holes will be 
the closest to the grasping (left) hand, on the left, with the result 
that were (more) solicited distal and intermediate holes of the bone 
when grasped by distal end, and proximal and intermediate holes when 
grasped by the proximal end.

Or you prefer a single hole, and you get fig. 37, where the reversibilty 
distal/proximal gives thes same (cumulative) image than on the 
intermediate hole of fig. 36.

I that conception, either the cord was recoiled each time, or the left 
part of the cord left in the left hand was used for return back the cord 
for a new action clockwise. And we get here in touch with a considerable 
point of technical progress/history of technics : nowadays, all our bits 
are clockwise acting/working (or : would it be the contrary elsewere, as 
for car driving ?). Maybe theses bones show the invention/revolution of 
the "one way drilling" - at a time before brace, and waiting for it.

It would be for me the third occurrence of "bonebearing witness for iron".

(1) with a seating/housing/recess/socket for the head/upper end of the 
bit ; I did not want to make my sentence heavier.

(2) This may be surprising. But listen and watch : when you have a 
cord/rope/string with a certain twisting (S, for example, which is 
contrary of Z twisting), and when you make a looping/bight/hair pin with 
it, the two parallel parts show the same twisting.

Paris, the first of April 2013.

-- 
François POPLIN

Directeur honoraire de l'UMR 7209 Archéozoologie, Archébotanique : sociétés, pratiques et environnements

Responsable du Séminaire d'Anthropozoologie

Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle
CP 56
Ancien Laboratoire d'Anatomie comparée
55, rue de Buffon
75005 Paris
01 40 79 33 11
fax ------ 33 14

francoispoplin.blogspot.com

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